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In Mission Bay Alliance v. Office of Community Investment & Infrastructure (2016) 6 Cal. App. 5th 160, the First Appellate District affirmed the trial court’s ruling that the Office of Community Investment and Infrastructure (OCII) complied fully with CEQA in approving a proposed 488,000-square foot multipurpose event center, which would serve as the Golden State…

In an unpublished opinion, Ventura Realty & Investment Company v. City of San Buenaventura, 2016 Cal. App. Unpub. LEXIS 7486, the Second Appellate District affirmed the trial court’s rulings and upheld the City of San Buenaventura’s (City) approval of changes to a plan to redevelop a 15-acre hospital district (Hospital Plan) proposed by Community…

Governor Jerry Brown signed Senate Bill (S.B.) 32, which will extend the State’s greenhouse gas targets from 2020 to 2030. The legislation builds on Assembly Bill (A.B.) 32, the California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, which required California to reduce greenhouse gas levels to 1990-era levels by 2020. Under S.B. 32, the State will…

In Defenders of Wildlife v. United States Fish & Wildlife Service, 2016 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 109509, the Northern District of California refused to preliminarily enjoin Panoche Valley Solar (PVS) from constructing a 247-megawatt solar facility comprised of approximately 1,529 acres of photovoltaic panels installed on a 2,154-acre site in the Panoche Valley in San…

In Imperial County, just north of the Mexican border, lies the Imperial Sand Dunes Planning Area, a 227,000-acre tract of desert, of which 214,930 acres is managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). This swath of land is home to the Algodones Dunes, the largest active sand dune system in the United States. A…

BoDean Company, Inc. (“BoDean”) operates an asphalt plant in the City of Santa Rosa. The plant is a vested and legal nonconforming use that has been in continuous operation since approximately 1953. In November 2011, BoDean proposed to install three new storage silos, ancillary conveyors, three batchers, and an air filtration system. The upgrade would…

CEQA has been in effect since 1970, when it was signed into law by Governor Ronald Regan. Over the past 46 years, there have been many debates about the effect CEQA has on the California economy. In response to recent analyses that link CEQA to economic challenges in the State, the Rose Foundation for Communities…

The City of Fresno’s Fulton Street lies in the heart of its downtown and was once a bustling commerce center lined with numerous retailers. Suburbanization drew those retailers to the periphery of town in the 1950s. In the early 1960s, in an attempt to revive its urban core, the City turned Fulton Street into Fulton…

After successfully defending a challenge to a resolution granting nonconforming use status to a mining operation in Santa Clara County, Respondent’s attorney filed a motion to recover costs associated with the preparation of the administrative record. This included the labor costs for the attorneys and paralegals who had assisted with the preparation of the large…